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PostPosted: Sun Dec 04, 2016 11:37 pm 
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Joined: Tue Mar 11, 2008 9:30 pm
Posts: 129
Location: Missoula Montana
the small minded citizens of the small town where I live have deemed my Lodestar RV project to be "Community Decay". they have generously allowed me to appeal this ruling to the city council. They have asked me for a plan to "remediate" the infraction of the city's ordinance.
There fore, I offer the airplane fuselage and the trailer it is attached to for sale.
the fuselage is gutted and clean inside. it still has the cockpit controls and seats, but at this moment, the instrument panel is missing.
I had planned to convert the plane into a recreational vehicle trailer. it has a living space of about 30 feet long, five feet wide and six and a half feet tall, not to mention storage space in the nose and tail. the windows, and doors and hatches are intact. I cut off about 10 feet of the tail to make the airplane road worthy. There are no wings or tail feathers.
I would like to recoup my investment and am offering it for $10,000.
Detailed photos on Photobucket: http://s291.photobucket.com/user/mrmoto ... t=3&page=1

thanks
Jim

Follows is what I know about the airplane and trailer:
1943 Lockheed C-60A Lodestar, Construction Number 18-2548, USAAF serial 42-56055,
The airplane is currently located at 411 Second Avenue South, Hot Springs, Montana
https://www.google.com/maps/place/411+2 ... 3965?hl=en
it is strapped to a 30 foot long bumper pull trailer and resting on its belly on old matresses. The trailer is registered and road worthy. The airplane and trailer are 46 feet long, eight feet wide, and 11 feet tall from radio masts to the ground.
The fuselage its self is 45 feet long, and 8 ½ feet tall from the radio masts to the bottom of the belly. The wing spars are 90 inches across. The interior is 256 inches from the back of the passenger door to the rear spar. The distance between the outside edge of the spars is 48 inches and the cockpit is 48 inches from the front spar to the instrument panel. The cockpit is 60 inches wide at the wing spar and 57 inches high. The spars are approximately 24 inches high from the floor to the top end of the spar. The passenger cabin is 66 inches wide at the floor and curves gracefully to a height of 77 inces from the crown of the cabin to the floor. The back of the door to the rear bulkhead is 84 inches and that space narrows from 50 inches at the door to about 36 inches at the rear of the fuselage. The space to the rear of the door could be used as a lavatory, bunk space or storage. The rear bulkhead has an opening of 30 inches tall by 22 inches wide. The rear passenger door is 64 inches tall and 32 inches wide. The lower cargo hatches are 29 by 23 inches and the front baggage door Is 37 by 31 inches. There is an escape hatch on the starboard side of the plane where one of the windows pulls out (above where the wing was). There is another hatch on the port side of the plane opposite the passenger door. The cockpit side windows slide back to open. None of the passenger windows open, except the escape hatch. Currently the floor consists of 4x8 plywood sheets. The plane originally came with long narrow wooden floor panels. There are still several in the plane. There is considerable underfloor space accessable through the baggage doors or through the floor, behind the baggage holds. The nose baggage hold is approximately 48 inches square. The fiberglass nose is empty space but accessible through the nose bulkhead or by removing it by turning the Dzus fittings. The fuselage’s balance point is behind the rear spar and is/was marked by pencil lines on the exterior. The airplane is of monocoque construction and is assembled using oval ribs and stringers. The ribs are 2 inches deep, allowing at least 1 ½ inches of insulation. Below the floor, there are two air ducts that carried heated air from the engines into the cabin. There is lots of space for wiring and piping. The plane comes with a storage tank for under the floor, some tubing, two pilot seats and other wires and hydraulic assemblies if you want the “steam punk” look.

Information about the airplane’s history from several internet sources:
Dates Event
Constructed as a C-60A-5-LO.
1943 Taken on Strength/Charge with the United States Army Air Force with s/n 42-56055.
To Great Lakes Steel Corp with c/r N14922.
22 March 1957 Certificate of airworthiness for N339 issued.
By 17 November 1966 To unknown owner with c/r N339.
17 November 1966 Involved in an incident.
Summarized NTSB narrative from report number CHI67A0065: There were no fatalities. Incident occurred at 16:52 hours. The damage was substantial. Incident occurred at the Meigs Airport, Chicago, IL. There was an unspecified incident while aborting takeoff. The factors included; airport conditions were a factor and came to rest in water. The emergency circumstances included; There was a false fire warning. Report remarks include: False engine fire warning below V1...

10 July 1996 To May Air Xpress Inc, New Boston, TX.
To Texarkana Municipal Airport (TXK), Texarkana, AR.
10 July 2011 Transported by ground.
Moved to Hot Springs, Montana.
To Jim Beyer.

NTSB accident report: http://www.ntsb.gov/_layouts/ntsb.aviat ... v_id=22289
________________________________________
42-56055
30JUL43 Delivered to the USAAF as L-18-56-23 C-60A-5-LO 42-56055.
NC14922
10APR46 Registered NC14922 to Lockheed Aircraft Corporation.
16APR46 Converted to civil standard by Lockheed and sold to National Steel Corporation.
N14922
14APR51 To Great Lakes Steel Corporation as N14922.
N338
08JAN57 Re-registered N338.
22MAR57 To Howard Aero.
17JUN60 Converted to a Howard 250.
31JUL67 To National Steel Corporation.
N339
17AUG67 Re-registered N339.
22SEP67 Donated to Cathedral of Tomorrow Inc.
25OCT68 To Sundorph Aeronautical Corp
The aircraft then passed through a succession of at least 18 owners. (These owners are not listed as it is acknowledged that any of the owners listed above could have changed the wing tips anyway!)
10JUL96 The last registered owner was May Air Xpress Inc. of Texarkana.
1997 The aircraft was flown from Chino, California to Texarkana, Arkansas and stored. This was its last flight.
2010 The City of Texarkana gave the aircraft to Gary Hilton for removal from the airport.
29SEP15 Both wing tips arrived at Caloundra having been sold to QAM by Gary Hilton.

http://www.warbirdinformationexchange.o ... p?p=328025

1942 USAAF Serial Numbers (42-50027 to 42-57212)
56055 (MSN 18-2548) to EAIA Cuba, no registration known. To Great Lakes Steel Corp as NC14922/N14922.
To N338, to N339, to N200KG but NTU. Stored Texarkana, Ar 1996. Certificate rexpired Mar 31, 2012.

http://www.joebaugher.com/usaf_serials/1942_3.html


Last edited by mrmoto on Sat Dec 10, 2016 11:59 am, edited 1 time in total.

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PostPosted: Mon Dec 05, 2016 7:31 am 
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1000+ Posts!
1000+ Posts!

Joined: Tue Jun 17, 2014 4:19 pm
Posts: 1377
mrmoto wrote:
the small minded city council of the small town I live in have deemed my Lodestar RV project to be "Community Decay". they have generously allowed me to appeal this ruling to the city council. They have asked me for a plan to "remediate" the infraction of the city's ordinance.
There fore, I offer the airplane fuselage and the trailer it is attached to for sale.
the fuselage is gutted and clean inside. it still has the cockpit controls and seats, but at this moment, the instrument panel is missing.
I had planned to convert the plane into a recreational vehicle trailer. it has a living space of about 30 feet long, six feet wide and six feet tall, not to mention storage space in the nose and tail. the windows, and doors and hatches are intact. I cut off about 10 feet of the tail to make the airplane road worthy. There are no wings or tail feathers.
I would like to recoup my investment and am offering it for $10,000.
I will post detailed photos on Photobucket this week.
thanks
Jim


Piss-poor in my book. Missoula is one of those places where the A-Listers move, so I guess someone has deemed it likely to deter further celebs from settling there. Been there a couple times and liked the place; I may rethink going back again if it's the province of a-holes like this.

Big shame and I feel your loss.


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PostPosted: Mon Dec 05, 2016 10:33 am 
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Joined: Tue Mar 11, 2008 9:30 pm
Posts: 129
Location: Missoula Montana
Please continue to come to Missoula.

Hot Springs is the small town that suddenly wants to be like Whitefish. It used to be populated with poor artists, cowboys and native Americans. now the town oligarchs that run the place want to gentrify the town and run out the poor people who live there now. dozens of houses are for sale and I may join the exodus.

Missoula is still a cool place that is more accepting of public art. I have two found art sculptures in my front yard and even the mayor knows me and approves. I can not say the same for Hot Springs.


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PostPosted: Tue Sep 12, 2017 10:52 pm 
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Joined: Tue Mar 11, 2008 9:30 pm
Posts: 129
Location: Missoula Montana
I sold the Lodestar fuselage to an high-end "green" architect who lives in Joshua Tree, CA. I hope he turns the plane into an art project or mini-home. I am off to hot springs MT to load the plane and trailer onto a low boy for carriage to CA. It was a fun dream but now it is time for some other dreamer to complete the project.
I am thinking smaller now and considering ripping the wings off a crap Beech 18 and turn it into a more moderately-sized tow-behind sleeper. Or Not.
I have the tail section of a wrecked Piper PA-28 that would make a nice weather vane and several other aircraft bits that could be converted from community decay into "art" for the amusement of the masses.


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